Some of Your Blood
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| Some Of Your Blood | |
| Author | Theodore Sturgeon |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Horror novel |
| Publication date | 1961 |
| Media type | Print () |
| ISBN | ISBN |
Some of Your Blood is a short horror novel in epistolary form by Theodore Sturgeon, first published in 1961.
[edit] Plot summary
The book opens with a prologue addressed directly to "The Reader", informing us that, as The Reader, "You know the way. You have the key. And it is your privilege", and that the story is fiction. The Reader is directed to the home of a Dr Philip Outerbridge (who is a fiction also, we are assured) and instructed to take out and examine one of the doctor's files. The prologue ends: "It is, it is, it really is fiction..."
The contents of the file are then presented. In the middle of "war, or something very like it", an American soldier, referred to by the name "George Smith" (though it later turns out his real first name is Bela) is transferred to Outerbridge's psychiatric clinic. Outerbridge's commander, Colonel Williams, states that Smith has been labelled "psychotic, dangerous" by a vindictive major, simply because Smith punched the major on the nose. Thanks to bureaucracy and general disorganisation, Smith has been in custody for too long, and Williams wants him quietly "processed" and discharged. Outerbridge gives Smith pen and paper and asks him to write down the story of his life, suggesting that he do so in the third person as an aid to objectivity.
Smith's autobiography takes up almost half the length of the book, and describes his deprived and violent rural childhood as the son of the town drunk. To escape from his home, Smith hunted in the woods. He also began a sexual relationship with a local girl called Anna, and helped support his family by stealing from the supermarket. Eventually he was caught at this and sent to prison, which he found extremely congenial because of its cleanliness and orderliness compared with his home life. Smith also relates the deaths of his parents and the personal crisis (Anna's pregnancy) which drove him to volunteer for the army. As with prison, he appreciated the orderliness of army life, but the sight of some casualties put him in an emotional turmoil and he wrote a letter home to Anna. This letter was what caused him to be brought before the major, who asked him, "What do you hunt for, George? I mean, just what do you get out of it?" Smith then attacked his guards.
The rest of the book consists of documents relating to Outerbridge's treatment of Smith, including their therapy sessions (with use of hypnosis), and correspondence between Outerbridge and the increasingly impatient Colonel Williams, who (because the clues are buried in Smith's highly detailed narrative) finds it difficult to believe Outerbridge's contention that Smith is the most dangerous patient in the hospital. Pressed for time, Outerbridge confronts Smith with what he has deduced - that Smith is a nonsupernatural vampire who drinks blood at times of emotional crisis - hence his compulsion to hunt. He has also been in the habit of feeding on the menstrual blood of his lover, Anna. Williams sends a nurse, Lucy Quigley, to research Smith's background, and she confirms Outerbridge's diagnosis. The last document in the file is Smith's letter: Dear Anna: I miss you very much. I wish I had some of your blood.
The Reader is then instructed to close the file and is offered various endings to the story, including the marriage of Outerbridge and Lucy Quigley and the possibilities of cure, imprisonment or death for Smith. The novel ends, "But you'd better put the file back and clear out. If Dr Outerbridge suddenly returns you'll have to admit he's real, and then all of this is. And that wouldn't do, would it?"
[edit] External links
- Some of Your Blood, Millipede Press 2006
